Ice dams occur when water from melting snow freezes near the edge of a roof, such as a gutter line, and traps other melt water behind it. This water can run back up under the shingles and rot the wood sheathing and leak into the house. Snow melt can be caused by ambient weather conditions or from heat escaping from the house. One way of preventing ice damming is removing snow from the roof before the snow melts. To avoid the risks associated with climbing onto the roof, snow rakes have been developed which can be manipulated by a user on the ground.
Conventional snow rakes include an elongate handle and a blade disposed at the distal end of the handle. A user standing on the ground can lift the handle such that the blade is disposed several feet above the edge of a pitched roof. The blade is disposed transversely to the pitch or fall line of the roof. Then, the handle is pulled proximally toward the user. This drags the blade down the roof. As the blade is dragged down the roof, snow is scraped from the roof and falls downward. Depending upon the depth of the snow, several passes will be necessary to skim off successive layers of snow. After successive layers of snow have been skimmed off from a particular portion of the roof, until the roof is exposed, then the user can move the rake to another portion of the roof.
As several layers of snow must generally be skimmed off before an area of a roof is cleared or exposed, clearing a roof with a conventional snow rake can be a time consuming chore. It would thus be desirable to have a tool which can more efficiently be used to clear snow from a roof.